"The Citadel"

Route: From Hagar dry gulch
Posted On: 6/29/2021, By: cougar
Info: Summer conditions from Hagar and Dry Gulch. South couloir below east ridge still holding firm snow most of the way, and rotten rock, axe recommended. Still a few snowfields on that approach from herman lake 

Route: Snoopy's
Posted On: 6/6/2021, By: Mike Shepherd
Info: Largely same as previous report. We summited and were back at the base at 8am. Snow soft on the hike out by 9 to 10am 

Route: Northeast Couloir/ Herman Gulch
Posted On: 6/2/2021, By: crowdsurf
Info: Snow became continuous on the trail about 2.5 miles in. Very minimal postholing in the morning. Snowshoes or skis recommended in the afternoon as always. The apron to the couloir was somewhat soft but overall the snow was supportive. The snow in the couloir was softer than hoped for, even with a partly cloudy forecast and cooler temps over the weekend. Only the final 50 ft of climbing was on bulletproof snow as it was shaded. The descent and traverse to the Bethel connecting ridge contained more supportive snow that held an ice axe well. With warmer temps forecasted soon, I would think a few days of below freezing temps will be needed to lock it up again. Great day! 

Route: North Collar
Posted On: 5/24/2021, By: dsr80304
Info: Climbed and skied this AM. Was about a mile dry hike before continuous snow - but that is on the other side of the creek. So we ended up booting like 2.5 miles or so before switching to skins. Was firm and fast hiking. Probably could have crossed the creek much earlier though (once snow covered) and skinned more. The whole basin was beautiful, with a tad bit of new snow. North Collar was pretty wrecked down the middle with prior wet avy debris. And while it froze last night, the prior days were pretty warm so the climb was pretty soft. We went up/down anyway and tried to harvest the edges which were much cleaner. But probably shoulda skied the East Bowl, much much cleaner South Collar looked pretty wind hammered 

Route: Snoopys Collar
Posted On: 5/20/2021, By: rosey33
Info: Left Denver at 3am arrived to trailhead at 4am hiking by 4:30. Parked at the gate of dry gulch and walked the road which is snow free for about 3/4 mile and then snow becomes continuous but it is avoidable for a little bit maybe 1/4 mile. After that it's snow the entire way and in the early morning it's supportive only post holing a handful of time. Did not use snowshoes or micro spikes. Put on crampons at the apron of climb around 6am. Snow is firm and very supportive making it like walking up steps. Summit at 7am. Sun never hit couloir. Hagar mountain receives early sunlight. Downclimbed facing inwards until at a more mellow angle to glissade and the glissade hurt like a bitch and was very fast. Was expecting a awful post hole nightmare going back through the trees but only sunk to my waist a handful of times and I never once cursed the snow, which I normally do on the way out. All in all great day. The motto was start early hike fast and climb hard. Round trip 7.3 miles for 4 hours and 46 minutes back to car 9:11 and in Denver at 10:15 I made great time driving there and back. 

Route: South Face/Snoopy Collar
Posted On: 4/25/2021, By: Kevin Baker
Info: Still a lot of snow in the Loveland Pass area. We picked this south facing snow climb because of the later sunhit. Quite a bit of wind transported snow on the face, so an early start is key. We started at 5am and sunhit didn't happen until we were high on the face at around 8:30. We elected to descend via the SE shoulder. There was already small point release activity occurring off the cliffs into the couloir on the Herman Gulch side by 9am. Excellent skin track in Dry Gulch. 

Route: South Face, Snoopys Collar
Posted On: 4/2/2021, By: hogantheepic
Info: Continuous snow from Dry Gulch trailhead all the way to the top of the notch. Conditions are certainly improving, and the spring snowpack is well on its way towards stability. That said, after digging a pit in a quite representative spot of the south face, we found a super deep snowpack (avg 2.15 m, n=12). The pit had mostly strong layers in the upper 3 feet, nothing too worrying, other than the highly variable wind slabs we encountered as we skinned and then bootpacked directly up the face of the Citadel. Skied from the notch, and we were able to ski (nearly) all the way back to the car without transitioning. The last half mile or so between the parking lot and the gate next to i70 was all uphill, so I switched to my shoes and walked up next to i70 to retrieve the car to end a truly fantastic day out. Get out there soon while there is a good skin track and bootpack established up the south face! Highly recommend bringing ice axe, and crampons could be nice too. Ski crampons would've been lovely to have for the skinning in a few places, though we made it work without any of this gear. Me and Jacob used our avy shovels as axes, and Nick used his touring poles. Definitely make sure you time your ski descents properly, or else you'll be dealing with slush galore like we were! 

Route: Dry Creek
Posted On: 11/30/2020, By: Mtn_Topper
Info: Route in great shape 

Route: Dry Gulch
Posted On: 9/20/2020, By: Pnick
Info: Started at Dry Gulch. There was a trail more or less up to about treeline, and then from there it was pretty easy route finding up to the east ridge of the Citadel. I'd recommend traversing west a ways through the flatter basin before ascending up to the ridge. There is a pretty distinct trail leading from the basin up to the ridge, so look for that. The final scramble was loose, but manageable. I'd recommend a helmet. It's a beautiful hike though and we only passed three people all day. 

Route: North Ridge (Traverse w/5.4 Chimney)
Posted On: 6/27/2020, By: moltar
Info: Totally clear, continued through to Bethel (came in from Pettingell), only snow was on southern most part of the descent to saddle 

Route: Herman Gulch
Posted On: 5/17/2020, By: Elote
Info: We climbed the northeast couloir on the Citadel yesterday. We started at 5:20. No snow for about the first half mile. We started to post hole after an hour and switched to skinning. We reached the couloir at 9:30 and switched to crampons. The cloud cover kept it nice and cool. There was lots of debris from wet slides. At the bottom of the couloir the snow was slushy with an inch of firm on top, which made for slow going, but once me made it a quarter of the way up, the snow firmed up and was perfect. We reached the summit at 11:15. The snow at the top was perfect, soft but not sloppy. I noticed the snow on the south side (I believe it's called Snoopy Collar) was very firm and needed more time. We dropped in at 11:45. The turns were great. Then we rode as far as we could until we transitioned back to skins. Snow was very slushy and unsupportive on the way out. It was a great day and I want more. 

Route: Snoopy Backside Couloir
Posted On: 5/9/2020, By: CreekRunner
Info: Did Citadel from Herman gulch. There is continous snow from 15 minutes out from the TH to the summit. Couloir was in excellent shape after last night's freeze, but as seen by the debris at the base, conditions can quickly change. We brought snowshoes and didn't use them, but they might be good in the coming weeks as snow melts more 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 10/7/2019, By: srsg90
Info: Summer conditions, no snow or ice 

Route: East Ridge, North Ridge
Posted On: 10/6/2019, By: supranihilest
Info: I took the Herman Gulch trail for a couple of miles then cut southwest towards Mount Bethel. I went up to the saddle just west of Bethel and then went straight to "The Citadel". Until I got high on "The Citadel" the ridge was Class 2. The start of the difficulties on "The Citadel" are very obvious; it transitions abruptly to steep scree. Go until a wide, loose gully and stick to the sides, since that's where the only solid and stable rock is. You might have to pull yourself up using the walls of the gully since there's very little else to get you up it. Scramble up Class 3 rock to the summit. If going to the west summit scramble along the Class 3/Class 3+ ridge to the other summit. If rappelling down climb until you can't go any further; this goes at Class 3 to Class 4. The rappel station was not obvious when I got there so I rigged my own by threading a large boulder with webbing and attaching a quick link, then rappelling the 40 or so foot pitch to the saddle. I used a 60 meter rope; a 50 meter would probably be perfect; a 40 meter would probably be stretching it; and a 30 meter might not be long enough. I did not confirm reports of other rappel anchors. If going to Pettingell scramble along the obvious north ridge at Class 2+ to Class 3. 

Route: East Ridge via Dry Gulch
Posted On: 9/22/2019, By: LetsGoMets
Info: Summer conditions, zero snow.